AEC - CAVE: Face à Face

2000

Catherine Ikam (FR)

Since 1992, Catherine Ikam and her partner Louis Fleri have, in coproduction with IRCAM, created 3D characters with realistic human faces. Those characters interact in real time with visitors in virtual reality installations according to the analogue and random behavioural patterns they gave to them. The purpose of this is not to design a game but to build the illusion of an emotional encounter with a human-like artefact. In spite of the fact, or perhaps because of the fact that they know it is an artefact, they feel an emotional response to it. What they're mainly interested in is how other people react to it. How do they react to each other through a hybrid mechanical and human interface? They'd like to explore the issues of emotion and interactivity, of presence/absence. How do people become emotionally involved when they interact in real time with 3D characters? What kind of behavioural patterns do they have to give them to build the illusion that they have autonomy, intentionality and agency?
Commissioned by: Ars Electronica